


A shade of gray

by Soroka



Category: Castlevania (Cartoon), 悪魔城ドラキュラ | Castlevania Series
Genre: Blood and Injury, Canon-Typical Violence, Childhood Memories, Developing Friendships, Fluff and Angst, Gen, Major Character Injury, Team Bonding
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-08-03
Updated: 2017-11-25
Packaged: 2018-12-10 17:53:36
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 3
Words: 9,060
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11696829
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Soroka/pseuds/Soroka
Summary: Dracula’s castle is not kind to anyone who opposes its master's will, no matter whose blood they share. As the group flees the catacombs under Gresit, Alucard finds that out the hard way.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Well, I'm writing Castlevania fanfic now. The vampire hunting trio's dynamic is too good to pass up.

The very moment they walk out of the chapel in the clock tower the godforsaken place turns on them.

Trevor really should have seen this coming and the fact that he hasn’t stings him in his family pride. It has been almost a full day since he’s last had a drink and his head is clear as a bell, a feeling he has mostly forgotten and one he would like to enjoy before being gutted like a fish. Ghoulish creatures straight from the guts of Hell keep pouring from every corner, an unending, screeching horde that outnumbers them a hundred to one and doesn’t stop advancing, no matter how many die at his hands. They crawl from the cracks in the floor, burst through stained glass windows and even melt with the shadows to follow them from room to room. Their persistence both amazes and infuriates him as his whip sings in the air, tearing them to pieces. If the name Belmont was still worth anything, they should have fled with their tails between their legs after taking one look at his family crest. He has been away from Wallachia for far too long. If they make it out alive, he’ll make these beasts regret ever forgetting them.

He hopes that they can still make it out alive.

He hears Alucard hiss in pain as a werewolf sinks its claws into his leg. Next to him, Sypha grunts and unleashes a blizzard upon a murder of blue crows circling her. It’s the biggest one he has seen her do yet and he cannot help but feel impressed at how quickly she has managed to adapt to the tight corners of the catacombs. He watches her sway under the strain of the spell and wonders how many of those does she have left in her. The battle for Gresit has drained them both and Trevor knows that it’s only a matter of time before the overwhelming numbers of Dracula’s army prevail. Their best hope right now is to find an exit and fast, before their fading strength gives out entirely.

A heavy wooden door creaks and protests as he drives his foot into it but after a few more kicks, it swings open allowing them some temporary cover. Sweat runs down Sypha’s pale face as she ducks out of the way of his whip and raises a protective ice barrier in the doorway, then leans heavily against a wall, panting with effort. Her strawberry blond hair clings to her forehead, damp with fresh blood.

“Didn’t we…?” her voice breaks as she quickly pulls away from the wall and sidesteps a crumbling floor section. “Didn’t we just pass this place? I’m pretty sure we’ve been here before.”

She points to a half-column on the opposite side of the hallway where a large statue of a knight peers down, right hand resting over a hilt of a broadsword, stone face smeared in blood. A hacked off arm with long hooked claws lies beneath its unwavering gaze, still twitching occasionally as life refuses to leave it. A torn off piece of Sypha’s blue tunic lies not too far away, splattered crimson red. Trevor looks at it for a few seconds, then curses for the hundredth time today. Circles! They are going in goddamn circles! Even if they manage to survive the next onslaught, they will eventually succumb to hunger, thirst and all the other weaknesses that mere humans like him are burdened with. The thought makes him see red for a moment as his attention drifts over to Alucard. Sypha’s sleeping soldier seems to have little concern for her discovery and is already walking ahead of the group, scrutinizing the flying buttresses criss-crossing in the darkness above. As he peers closer, Trevor notices that he’s favoring his right leg. His silent footsteps leave behind a thin, but constant trail of blood that pools between the cracks in the floor.

“Hey, you! Vampire!” he barks. “Aren’t you supposed to know where the hell we’re going?”

Alucard’s long fingers run over the smooth wooden carvings on the wall. His golden eyes have an odd, faraway look, as if he’s trying to conjure up some fleeting memory but they narrow at his tone. “You should keep your voice down, Belmont. We do not need to call any more attention to ourselves.”

Trevor just rolls up his whip, drenched in dark, sticky blood and spits out a glob of blood that keeps welling up under his broken tooth. “Who the fuck cares? This place has eyes everywhere, it won’t take these bastards much time to find us again. If I wasn’t such a trusting individual I would suspect that you’ve been leading us into a trap.”

At the corner of his eye, he catches Sypha’s disapproving glance but Alucard ignores his accusation entirely. “The castle has a will of its own and it is rarely kind to strangers. Much of it has changed in the year I was asleep. It is hard to remember my way around especially now that its master has abandoned it.”

Trevor groans as every pain dulled by previous surges of adrenaline hits him at once. “In other words, you have no idea where we’re going,” he turns to the Speaker magician who is still frowning at him and pinches the bridge of his nose in frustration. “Some messiah he’s turning out to be. I should have staked his sorry ass when I had the chance, prophecy or not.”

To his surprise, she does not chastise him again, just lowers herself onto the floor, lips pressed into a tight line. “Are you sure about that?”, she asks after a while. “We’ve been wandering around this place for hours now. Maybe Dracula is still here, manipulating the castle. Maybe we should stop moving.”

For the first time since they left the tower, Trevor hears doubt and resignation in her voice. Maybe Alucard hears it too because he stops and turns to face them both, his tone urgent. “My father has left but his spirit still lingers. I do not know how strong it is but as long as a part of him remains here, we cannot let our guard down.”

She gives him a tired nod and stands up, blue eyes hooded in the eerie, foreign glow of the lamps that adorn the walls. Trevor feels a sting of pity for her; he knows that she is dead on her feet but as long as they are walking these cursed halls, they need her magic. He throws her a sympathetic glance and walks forward to join Alucard, who is standing very still at the end of the darkening hallway as it bends into a corner.

“What?” His fingers immediately close around the handle of this whip but Alucard does not reply. He peers blankly ahead unblinking, as if transfixed by a mirage. Trevor’s paranoid mind immediately conjures up images of disembodied medusa heads paralyzing victims with their stare. Before he can lament not having a mirror on hand, his companion breaks out of his momentary stupor and raises a pale hand, stopping them both in their tracks.

“We should leave. Now.” He announces right as Sypha, overcome by curiosity, steps forward and lets out a quiet exclamation of wonder.

When Trevor follows her, purely out of spite, he finds himself staring at a large double door, carved out of faded green malachite and flanked between two Gothic columns that rise into a cracked semi vault. Most of the carvings and ornaments that adorn it have worn away with age and a thin web of cracks covers what was once surely a fine work of art. In the half-light of the rapidly dimming lamps, Trevor can only make out the remnants of a design that vaguely resembles a swarm of bats.

For a moment, his head swims with memories of his father’s and grandfather’s tales as he feels his stomach drop to his feet and his whole body break in cold sweat. Damn right, they should leave. He has only ever heard vivid descriptions of doors like that and he knows that they are bad news. They are no match for whatever lies behind, not now when they are exhausted and haven’t had a decent meal in ages. Even the damn vampire seems about to drop any time soon. Going in there would be suicide, it would be absolute madness.

He knows that, and yet he feels his hand close tighter around his whip as he curses his rotten luck. They are trapped in a hallway, between a bloodthirsty horde and a fight they are not likely to win. Either way, the ice barrier will melt away soon or the monsters will manage to claw their way through it. Even if they manage to break down a wall to escape, they have no idea where to go and eventually, the castle will close in on them, like a shroud over a corpse. As a Belmont, he refuses to accept that fate. If they want to live another day, there’s no way for them to go but forward.

“Where does that lead?” Sypha’s hands run over the cracks in the green stone as she gives Alucard a quizzical look.

Trevor sees the golden eyes darken at her question, then takes a deep breath and pushes the door open. “I don’t care. As far as I’m concerned, it leads out of here.”

* * *

Alucard is nine years old and he is lost.

He’s not particularly worried about it, though. He has wandered off before, far away from his keep into the shifting, ever-changing depths of his father’s domain and he has always managed to find his way back even though it is always through a different route. The castle seems alive around him, it flows like a mighty river, contained only by his father will and always threatening to spill over the land beyond it, where everything seems toned down, like a faded portrait or a music box that’s ever so slightly out of tune. The people out there shy away from him and even the children his age flee screaming every time he smiles. Besides, the sunlight makes him feel slow and sluggish, as if he was moving through water. His tiny legs barely manage to keep up with his mother and he is always sleepy when they come back. Despite that, she insists in taking him into the sun for a few hours every day, she says it will help him adapt to living among humans when he is older. He doesn’t understand what it means but it seems important and he wants to make her happy.

That is why they usually take their longer walks after sundown, when the day grows quiet and the air is cool and welcoming. At night, every barrier is lifted as he’s free to run in circles, jump and roll in the cold, dew-covered grass and his mother is the one who lags behind. The world outside seems bigger and wider then; it makes him wonder what lies beyond the village at the foot of the castle and even beyond the city of Gresit. There’s a detailed map of Wallachia that hangs in his private keep, with every bit of the country’s varied landscape lovingly detailed and every time he looks at it he feels dismayed at how he will probably never get to see it until the sun stops weighing on him like a ball and chain. He wants to see it now, he wants to see everything.

But every once in a while, there’s another secret purpose to their nightly outings. Sometimes, his mother takes a small sack of pills and ointments with her, walks to a wheat field next to the village and waits under a large sprawling willow tree for the same people who shun her during the day. They come with bowed heads and speak in mutters, their muscles tense like a spring as they take her medicines in exchange for trinkets, fresh fruits and vegetables and the occasional toy for him. They keep coming back, despite the paralyzing fear and his mother never turns them away though her face turns sadder every night. One night he asks her why everyone is so afraid of them and she does not answer. She just takes him gently by the hand and in a very stern tone makes him promise to never go into town without her.

“Not even at night?”, he asks and watches her eyes turn colder.

“No, Adrian, not even at night. They know your face, as they know mine. It’s not safe for any of us out there.”

He sulks for a while, idly braiding long blades of grass. “But we go out every day, don’t we?”, he asks eventually.

His mother just smiles and shrugs her coat off her shoulders. “Just because we aren’t ready for a fight, doesn’t mean we can’t train for it.” She bends, rummages through the contents of her sack and pulls out a small round flask with a deep-crimson liquid sloshing inside. “Come here! Let’s see if you like the taste of this one better.”

Alucard pauses for a moment as he picks up a hint of sadness in her voice. He wants to ask her who they have to fight and whether it has anything to do with their father never coming with them on their walks. However, it has been another long day and he’s hungrier than he has ever been so he just nods and runs towards his mother, batting away swarms of fireflies.

The overwhelming curiosity for the outside world never goes away though, not even the unending oddities of the castle can quell it. Even now, as he walks the winding hallways decked in detailed wooden carvings that look like a dense forest he can’t help but wonder what an actual forest looks like. He has only ever seen them in paintings and tapestries and every time he has laid eyes upon them, he feels restless. Something about those lush, green canopies under the moonlight fills him with a strange longing. He wonders if it’s possible to feel nostalgia for a place he has never seen.

Lost in thought as he is, he almost walks face first into the giant door. It rises tall, ominous and impossibly beautiful, like an altarpiece to an odd, winged god that none of his mythology books mention. When he lays a hand over the cold surface, it feels alive under his skin. A soft, tingling sensation spreads through his fingertips and makes the hair on his arm stand on end. Behind it, his keen ears pick up the soft wailing of wind.

He hesitates for a moment and leans on the heavy stone trying in vain to push it open. After a few moment of pointless struggle, he reaches towards the heavy ouroboros-shaped ring and knocks on the door.

It swings open effortlessly and he is greeted with a gust of cool, night air. He walks forward gingerly and stands in a large chamber decked in deep-green malachite with even more carvings of leaves and branches. A large ribbed vault hangs above him supported by slender columns that rise along the walls. Suspended from a large, wooden beam running across the vault, a gigantic bat hangs upside down, wings wrapped tightly across its body like a leathery cocoon. Its blood-red eyes fly open when he walks closer.

Alucard doesn’t know if he should be afraid. He considers running away but the crimson gaze of the beast is hypnotic. He stands frozen, pinned to the floor like a butterfly in a faded album and suddenly, feels a familiar inexplicable longing wash over him. He feels like he had just stumbled on an answer to a question he doesn’t recall asking and as he finally manages to look past the fiery eyes of the creature, another much more confusing puzzle forms in his mind.

Far above where the ribs of the vault converge, hidden in the darkness and visible only to his vampiric eyes is a wooden trapdoor, just large enough for a grown person to fit through. It hangs open, swaying gently on creaking hinges. A gentle night breeze sifts through, carrying smells of wild thyme and cornflower. The full moon on a patch of a starry sky peers down at him and looking at it sends a tingling sensation through his body again.

He looks back at the giant bat, wondering how a creature so big could possibly fit through there. The room clearly has no other exits and even the heavy malachite door is too narrow. The creature’s red gaze is still fixed on him, as if pondering whether he would make a good late night snack and a low, guttural voice rings in his head, bypassing his ears entirely.

He doesn’t understand the words at first. They sound unnatural to him, as if uttered by something that could never hope to imitate human speech but their true meaning seeps beneath his skin and unravels the binds that hold his fragile, impractical human form together. The creature’s gigantic claws let go of the beam and it plummets towards the cold marble floor but before touching it, it blurs and dissolves into a cloud of hundreds of bats that swirl around the chamber like a sleek, black tornado. They envelop him whole, tugging at him, pulling at his clothes and suddenly, he is one of them, dancing madly in the air as his newly discovered wings carry him further and further towards the blinking stars above. He plunges into the dark, beckoning void of the sky, small and insignificant, as his fellow bats howl and screech around him. Images of impossibly tall cathedrals, deep, haunting woods and moonlit caverns spill into his head for a second, he hangs limp in the air, overwhelmed by the bat hive mind. When he recovers, he can only send back one, single thought.

_Show me._

The swarm needn’t be told twice. It swoops up, a long, black shadow against the shining stars and rushes away from the castle. Alucard feels his new, bat mouth split in a long-toothed grin as he catches the night air beneath his wings and follows it. He follows it every full moon from then on.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry I'm late. Very late. To make up for it, I added another chapter and I'm now furiously writing the finale.

For the first time ever, Alucard feels unwelcome in his father’s domain.

The castle has never considered him its master, no matter whose blood flowed in his veins, but it was still a reflection of his father’s will and it was kind to him and his mother even though they both tended to get lost in its labyrinthine hallways. It was warm when winter fell and pleasantly cool when the summer sun turned his mother’s skin a darker shade of gold. There was always food when he got hungry and water when he was thirsty. All lost items turned up in his private chambers eventually. A scraggly, rake-thin cat he had snuck past his parents’ watchful gaze managed to wander the place for a week before returning to him groomed and packing a few more pounds. Its myriads of doors were always open to him, and what was most important, there was always somewhere new to go. Undiscovered libraries, secret gardens and whole new sections of the castle showed up every time he decided to go for a stroll and they were always full of wonder and mystery. Whenever he turned around a corner in a corridor he had never seen before, he would not even consider feeling apprehension. The castle was his home and it would never hurt him or anyone under his protection.

The moment he steps out of the clock tower, he knows that his home is gone.

The place feels empty and cold around him, nothing but sharp edges and coarse stone. It crumbles under his feet, trips him up any chance it gets and jams every door he tries to pry open. The once familiar hallways are now a twisted maze, dark and foreboding where the air smells stale and the darkness weighs on him worse than the Wallachian sun in his childhood years. The castle hangs before his eyes like a treacherous mirage, and if it is still alive, it hates him and everything he stands for. He can feel it in every step he takes, in every room he enters.

But nothing can compare to what he feels when he lays eyes upon the malachite chamber.

His open palm slams over Trevor’s gloved hand with more force than he intended. “For all your paranoia Belmont, you have no problem walking straight into a trap.”

The brown eyes flash with anger as he quickly pulls his hand away. “Is that so?” he retorts venom dripping from every word, “Enlighten me, then, because that hunk of ice won’t last much longer and we really don’t want to be here when it breaks.”

As if on cue, the thick crust of ice groans and creaks, like a dam about to burst. Alucard hears dozens of claws frenetically digging at the frozen surface on the other side, chipping away at it slowly but relentlessly. He looks at Sypha, whose blue eyes have been darting fearfully at the door for the past few minutes and wonders if she too can feel the air crackling around it, like an open flame hungry for kindling.

“Can you raise another one?” he asks.

She cringes as the ice wall budges just enough to make her turn pale. “Not anytime soon, but I can freeze the edges of the door. It won’t stop them but it will hurt.”

She raises her hand to perform the incantation but Trevor lays a hand on her shoulder. “Don’t, save your strength! Even if we manage to hold them off, they will never retreat.” He takes a long surly look at the malachite door, then turns back to Alucard, his face grim. “Like it or not, this right here is our best option. So if you know something we don’t, you better come out with it now before I seriously consider putting my dagger through your guts.”

“If you need an outlet for your violence, Belmont, Wallachia is crawling with better targets”, he replies and watches the hunter’s weary face twitch in frustration. “This is the Malachite Observatory at the end of Skyward Keep. It is the home of Camazotz, a demonic bat that served as my father’s eyes and ears in this land.”

They all flinch involuntarily as another loud crack rocks the structure behind them. Trevor lets out a long, frustrated groan. “So, it’s an overgrown bat, big deal. I thought you were a vampire. What has you quaking in your fancy boots so much?”

There’s mockery in his tone but Alucard can still hear the well-hidden nervousness behind it. He pauses for a short while as he stands closer to the door, touching it gently with his fingertips. An odd, unpleasant sensation invades him, as if clammy hands are groping around his skull, picking at his very thoughts. A dark presence suddenly looms over him. Before he can pull away, crimson eyes with bottomless pupils open at the back of his mind and a single foreign thought seeps through.

_Come and see._

Against his will his eyelids slip closed and light explodes behind them, followed by the sound of screams and the acrid smell of smoke. He sees a horde of winged creatures pouring from the sky as shutters slam closed over every window in Gresit. A young boy pounds frenetically on the door of a church before a fanged maw snaps his neck with a sickening crunch. A large crowd on the city square, mad with fear and without shelter darts helplessly to and fro until it is decimated by razor-sharp claws. The survivors cower in barrels and under wooden crates, powerless to help the weeping children who are carried into the air and torn apart like rag dolls. Blood pools between the cobblestones and its pungent, metallic smell is even more intoxicating through the senses of a bat. He winces and tries to break free but the hive mind closes in, threatening to drag his thoughts away from humanity and into the realm of beasts.

A cautious female voice brings him back to reality as he feels a hand gently clasp his shoulder. “Alucard? Are you alright? What’s wrong?”

He nods slowly and looks back at his companions, fists clenched to hide the slight trembling in his hands. “It is as I feared, I’m afraid. When my father summoned the armies of Hell, it twisted many of his servants into creatures of chaos and destruction. The demon that lived in the Malachite Observatory became Camazotz the Deathbringer and it has been terrorizing Wallachia ever since.” Sypha’s blue eyes widen as her hand tightens on his shoulder. “We are no match for it on a good day, let alone now.”

Whatever impact he had hoped his words to make is lost on Trevor who just rolls his eyes and steps closer to the cracked door. “Speak for yourself, vampire. This thing does not know who it’s dealing with.” He lets out a hiss of pain as he secures an improvised bandage on his forearm with his teeth and adds “For someone who’s slept through a year, you seem to know a hell of a lot of things. You could deign to share with us mere mortals every once in a while.”

His cocky demeanor is reduced to a howl of pain as Alucard presses his fingers to the hunter’s temple and sends him crashing to his knees. Trevor’s face grows pale under the caked dirt as he gets back on his feet and staggers away, rubbing his forehead. His disorientation is brief as mere seconds later he grabs Alucard by the lapels of his coat and slams him against the malachite door.

“What the flying fuck was that?” he growls, his pupils wide under the waning light of the lamps on the walls. “Do that again and I swear to every God I know I’ll gut you where you stand.”

Alucard holds his furious gaze for a while but raises his hands in an apologetic gesture after the hunter loosens his grasp. “Sorry, you said you wanted to know. When I said that Camazotz used to be my father’s eyes and ears I wasn’t being metaphorical. It is a shared consciousness that keeps an echo of every mind it ever contained. In my case, it’s just enough for a telepathic link.”

Trevor nods back and mutters a long string of curses, still rubbing the sides of his head. “Great, so you can talk to it. Tell it to leave us alone, would you? For old time’s sake or something like that.”

“I can, but it won’t listen. It’s too far gone for words.”

Trevor groans and turns to the Speaker Magician, as he flicks his thumb at Alucard. “Does your prophecy say at which point he becomes useful? Does it also happen to say if we can return him?”

Sypha, who has been silently pondering for a while now, ignores Trevor’s sarcasm completely. Instead, she turns to Alucard with renewed hope in her voice. “Wait, did you say this is an observatory? There’s actual sky above us?”

For a second, he loathes to be the bearer of bad news. “There might be but I wouldn’t count on it. Skyward Keep is the highest point of the castle and we haven’t left the catacombs. Whatever will is operating behind these walls, it wants us to think we’re close to the exit. It wants us to go in there and meet a very grisly end.”

Trevor barks a short laugh at him as he points at the ice-blocked entrance to the hallway. “In that case, we should stay here because the things over there clearly just want to smother us with kisses. I’m really glad you’ve come along, vampire. Your guidance has been priceless so far!”

Maybe it’s his vampiric heritage talking but Alucard feels his patience wearing dangerously thin around Trevor Belmont. “Listen, I already said this was a trap! What’s behind that door may be responsible for half of the deaths in Gresit and it has no problems adding three more to the pile. The things behind that barrier have been going at it for a while, which means they will be exhausted and easier to deal with. Which odds to you like better?”

Trevor side-eyes his consecrated whip. “I get to kill your daddy’s minions either way. And you said it yourself, we need to keep moving. Even if they all fall over and die after the barrier is broken, we will have to go in eventually.” His mouth stretches into a long sneer.” Unless you’re ready to quit and go back home, Sleeping Soldier. Though technically, you haven’t even left home.”

He knows that the hunter is trying to get a rise out of him but he’s tired enough for it to work. “Is this all a game to you, Belmont?” he snaps. “In case you didn’t notice, I’m trying to keep us alive long enough to find a way out.” Another worrying crack in the ice prompts him to glance back at the observatory door and let out a short sigh of resignation. “But if you feel the urge to be suicidal, you need to follow my lead and be silent…”

Before he can get another word in, the barrier emits a long, ear-splitting screech and cracks in the middle. Frozen shards fly in their direction, sharp as needles as the floor shakes beneath them. A giant broadsword suddenly bursts through the weakened barrier wielded by an armored knight, oozing a dark, steaming substance out of a large crack in its breastplate. It stands in place for a while as the ice wall crumbles around it, then wields the sword above his head and charges at them at full speed.

It only manages a few steps before it trips on the ice scattered over the marble floor, falls forward, sword first and hurtles aimlessly towards them. The haunted armors behind it quickly suffer the same fate as does the heavy spiked battering ram they had been using all along. Their spiked helmets tear through the unlucky fleamen caught in the way as the sharp mass of steel gains even more speed. At the corner of his eye, Alucard sees Trevor’s eyes widen and his lips mouth a long-winded curse.

“Looks like debate’s over!” Sypha grabs them both by their sleeves and jerks them towards the door. “Run! Run before it smashes into us!”

None of them needs to be told twice. Trevor turns around, kicks open the door and yells out in pain as he barely manages to crack it open enough for them to squeeze through. He sneaks in just in time before the heavy suit of armor crashes into the stone slab widening the gap. It lays immobile, oozing black blood but Alucard knows it’s only a matter of time before the hellish minions behind it pour in. He leans on the smooth surface and pushes with all his might but his efforts are futile until Trevor and Sypha join him. Finally, with a groan and a screech, the heavy slab slides back in place, effectively sealing them inside.

* * *

For a while, none of them speaks a word. They lie with their backs against the cold stone, gasping for air as the monsters claw at it from the other side. Their efforts never cease but every second the sounds drift further away as if the chamber itself is sinking deeper into the entrails of the castle. Alucard rests his forehead on the wall and immediately recoils from it as an image of long yellow fangs dripping blood flashes across his mind. The dark presence in his mind draws nearer and, for second, he can almost smell wild thyme and cornflower in the musty air.

He raises his head and finds the wooden trapdoor exactly where he expects it to be, lodged between the ribs of the malachite vault and shut tight. He almost dares to hope and as Sypha follows his gaze, he sees her tired face light up with a grin.

“You did it!” She springs up and runs towards the center of the chamber, her fingers closely knit together as frost gathers across them. “I knew it! I knew you wouldn’t lead us astray!”

He sees Trevor’s eyes go wide as he tries to stop her but before either of them can utter a word, she brings her arm in an arc and launches a thin ice shard straight towards the trapdoor.

It proves much sturdier than he thought. The shard shatters upon impact, only barely damaging the wood. Ice and splinters rain over the floor but as the cloud of sawdust dissipates, Alucard’s heart sinks. From behind the barely visible crack in the wood, cold, green stone stares at them instead of the starry sky he had come to miss so much. Another well calculated ice spike only manages to crack the trapdoor a bit more, revealing another section of the malachite vault. He sees Sypha’s fingers ice up for a third time before she stops the spell halfway through and lets her arm hang limp.

“What the...?”

She sounds so defeated that a wave of guilt suddenly washes over him and he avoid her eyes. She blinks back tears and turns to Trevor Belmont, who just lets out a long, pained groan and mutters, “Great, now what?”

There’s an almost imperceptible croak in his voice as if he’s trying to suppress his own despair at seeing the hope of freedom snatched away from him. Alucard leans away from the cold stone and slowly walks towards the trapdoor, his footsteps uncomfortably loud in the heavy silence. “I told you, it’s just another trick of the castle. It led us here on purpose. It wants us to…”

The rest of the words die in his throat as a particularly nasty realization hits him straight in the gut. The castle may have been playing tricks on them from the start but in this case, it had taken the trouble to weave a cruel joke around a beloved childhood memory intended for him specifically. In the worst case scenario, that makes him a liability to the group. In the best one, it just makes him creatively useless.

The sound of leathery wings and the smell of sulfur break him out of his bitter epiphany. The long shadows that weave the crepuscular darkness of the chamber come alive as hundreds of blood-red eyes open all around them. A hissing cloud of winged creatures surges upwards, a dark, unformed mass that blurs and shifts before morphing into a familiar shape that makes Alucard’s stomach tie into knots. It has been a long time since he last soared in the night sky, clothed in fur and fangs and carried only by his own insatiable thirst for discovery. Those fond memories seem all but alien now that his loyal companion snarls menacingly at him as pure, unbridled hatred burns in its eyes. But that is the price for all demons living in his father’s domain. The castle is an extension of Dracula’s will, it obeys him alone. And when that will turns against them, there is nothing they can do except obey.

He wonders if he can lift the curse from his companion once they’ve completed their mission. He wonders if he can put his broken home back together but he might as well wish for the moon to shine in the sky forever. His family’s fate was sealed since the day his father unleashed the armies of Hell upon Wallachia, it was sealed when his mother was tied to that stake. The past is a beautiful melody that still rings in his ears but there’s no one left alive to play it again.

The air in the malachite chamber grows cold and heavy. From beneath the cracked vault, Camazotz bares his long, yellow fangs and lunges at them with an unearthly howl.

Trevor Belmont steps forward brandishing his whip, a mocking grin upon his face. “See? I told you it was just an overgrown bat. How tough can he be?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for reading! As always, save a writer, leave a comment.


	3. Chapter 3

For the hundredth time today, Trevor finds himself cursing his rotten luck.

Fate has always been just kind enough to the Belmont family to keep them on their toes, which is why over the years most of them developed an odd fixation with lucky charms and amulets. His father and mother both carried halves of a lapis lazuli stone that was split by lightning on the day he was born and his grandfather had a silver pendant sown into his left boot. Trevor himself had worn a small rag doll close to his heart for years before a very unfortunate encounter with a wyvern had it catch fire along with the rest of his clothes. Whatever power it had was ruined and he never picked up another trinket designed to convince Death to look the other way. As he leaps backwards and his whip unfolds in the air to unleash another blow at the bat, he really begins to regret that decision.

He sees hatred flash in the demon’s eyes as they settle on his family crest and for a second, feels his chest overflow with anger. Anger at Dracula’s armies for tearing his country apart, anger at the Church for allowing it to happen, and most of all, anger at the fickle hand of fate for sparing him in the face of it all. His parents had died fighting the same darkness spilling beyond the borders of his doomed homeland, feared and ostracized even by the refugees fleeing Wallachia in droves. He had seen the light go out in their eyes and both times, wondered why he continued to draw breath when everything his family fought to protect was crumbling around him. The cheap booze he had found comfort in did little to silence the screams in his ears or to keep the nightmares away but eventually, it dulled his mind enough for a sick feeling of schadenfreude to settle in. He returned to Wallachia, a shadow of his former self, not as a wandering hero but to witness the fall of everything he held dear and dance on the graves of the people responsible.

And then he met Sypha Belnades, with her wide blue-eyed naiveté and unshakable faith in the ultimate triumph of the human spirit. Sypha, who ventured into the depths of Dracula’s castle armed with nothing but her wit and her spells, knowing full well that there would be no rescue if things turned sour. He wasn’t sure whether that made her suicidally brave or plain suicidal but it struck a chord with him, one that he had forgotten the sound of. And when a slender, golden-eyed figure floated out of the coffin in the clock tower he heard the same chord resonate through him again.

_Do you care, Belmont?_

The question was enough to unravel everything he kept telling himself as he roamed the Wallachian countryside, pissing away what remained of the family fortune and seething with contempt at the pale faces staring at the sky fearfully, waiting for the next attack. Most of them had happily sided with the Archbishop when he announced his family’s excommunication. Now, they feared the night, hiding like children when dusk bled away and fooling themselves into thinking that stronger locks would somehow keep the armies of Hell from tearing them apart. He listened to their stories relayed in hushed whispers in the taverns and told himself that they all deserved it, that his family’s souls would be avenged if Wallachia burned to the ground, that his heart did not break for his people at all.

_I asked you a question. Do you care?_

Well, he does. How can he not? He just hopes that his path to redemption does not meet a gruesome end before he even gets started.

He leaps to the side as row of fangs the length of his forearm crushes the air an inch away from his neck. A blizzard of thin but sharp ice needles materializes around the creature’s head, sending it into a panicked shriek. Sypha’s frost covered fingers close in a fist before her face and the needles thicken until they turn into hail that pelts the creature from all sides. The demon bat soars towards the malachite vault, deceptively fast for its huge size, blood-red eyes sweeping the chamber for the source of its misery. Before it can put two and two together, the consecrated whip describes a complicated arc in the air and tears into its back, right between its massive wings. A pained roar echoes in Trevor’s ears but the attack only seems to make it angry. It whirls around, dripping blood on the marble floor and lunges at him, screeching in rage. 

It is a dance Trevor is getting tired of.

He wonders how long he can keep it up before the inevitable outcome. The magic bound in his whip, as well as the weapon’s own destructive force has taken a considerable toll but by now, blood is running freely down his face and flowing directly into his eyes, giving the malachite chamber a crimson tinge. He can feel his limbs growing heavier with every crack of the whip and every step proves significantly harder than the one before. He ducks out of the way of another attack, rolls to his feet and feels his heart skip a beat as the marble floor cracks under the weight of the claws digging into it. If he or any of his companions find themselves in the way of those, they are done. And if the fight continues this way, the only thing the demon will have to do is outlast them and then disembowel their unconscious bodies.

For a moment, poison trickles into this thoughts, past the adrenaline and the anger. Where do they go even if they manage to defeat it? There is no way out of this chamber and even if they find one, the castle will just conjure up another riddle. Dracula’s has had them in the palm of his hand this entire time. The monsters in their path were just there just to make them think they were making any kind of progress.

But that is for future Trevor to deal with. As long as they fight, there is hope. As long as they keep raining damage on this overgrown infestation, he does not have to think about their grim future prospects.

He cracks his whip again right as a gigantic wing sweeps through the air and he feels hot, sticky blood spray his face. The few precious seconds his sight is compromised are enough for the monster to attempt to rip his head clean off. He swerves at the blurry vision of yellow fangs closing near, frantically searching for a spare dagger in his belt but before he can find it, the air sings next to him and a sword parries a claw about to tear into his side. Trevor has just enough time to wipe the sticky goo away from his eyes and sees another claw lunging for his stomach. His fingers finally close over a hilt and bring the blade down straight into the demon’s wrist. It wails, sending ripples of agony through the chamber and falls back before flapping clumsily upwards, taking Trevor’s last dagger with it.

Alucard lets out a long, labored breath as he half-leans, half-collapses against a column. “Watch your back, Belmont! You will have no second chances.”

Trevor feels his mouth twist into a scowl as he takes cover behind the same column, his heart drumming against his ribs. The last thing he needs is someone pointing out all the close calls they have had and how frequent they have become. Not that the vampire can boast complete invulnerability either. His long blond hair is by now thoroughly caked in blood and as Trevor’s vision clears he notices a deep cut across his pale forehead that is slowly inching closed. He allows his eyes to linger on it for a moment, wondering if Alucard will be the last unlucky bastard left standing if things take a turn for the worst.

Not if he can help it. He may have been away from home for too long but he is a Belmont and his family’s legacy still burns within him. He will deliver the killing blow even if he has to do it with his last breath.

“Watch your own back, I can handle myself.” His face falls as it watches the airborne creature attempt to pull the dagger out with its teeth amidst low growls of pain. “What is it with this thing? It’s bleeding like a stuck pig and it’s still fighting. Doesn’t it know when to quit?”

Alucard takes another shaky breath. Trevor sees his eyes move behind his closed eyelids, as if lost in a vivid dream. A few seconds later they open and give him a weary look. “It is trapped here, just like we are. It has no other choice but to fight to the death.”

Trevor suppresses another long-winded curse as he gathers this whip in his hand. “Great...” he mutters. “We got ourselves a rabid dog off its chain. I hate those, they’d rip out their kidneys and throw them at you if they could.”

For a second he sees the vampire’s thin eyebrows twitch under the matted, blond hair. “Need I remind you that we could have avoided this situation altogether? You seem eager to quit now that it isn’t going your way.”

“Says the man, who spent a year hiding in a coffin, away from the action.” Trevor catches Sypha signaling to him meaningfully from the other side of the chamber and grins. “When you’re thrown into a river of shit you either swim as fast as possible or sink and wait for it to turn into gravy. I like my approach better.”

The golden eyes roll as a slender hand closes over his pale face. “Would you like to survive that approach?”

Trevor hesitates for a moment, then lets out a mirthless laugh. He cannot remember the last member of the Belmont family who had died peacefully in their bed. He hopes to be the first person to break that poignant tradition but try as he might, he doesn’t trust the fickle hand of fate one bit. If this is his last dance, he better go out in style.

He shrugs and peers from behind the column as he watches the creature rip his dagger out and drop it to the marble floor with a loud clatter “In my line of work, that’s not a requirement, as long as the job gets done.”

The ghost of a smirk touches Alucard’s lips but he does not return his fatalistic grin. “Then keep your eyes open, Belmont. This place is very eager to grant your wish.”

On the other side of the chamber Sypha envelops herself in a ball of fire. The creature hisses as a long plume of flame licks it and the pungent smell of burnt flesh fills the chamber. Her next attack burns even brighter but a few seconds later it starts to flicker and sway like a candle in the wind. Trevor sees her blue eyes widen in panic as she only barely manages to hide behind a malachite column that bears the brunt of the demon’s onslaught, then cracks as if made of sugar. Its teeth grab a hold of her robes and pull her closer but not before she turns around and slams an ice spike right into the long tongue lapping at her wounds. Dark blood pours over her hands and face as it lets go and stumbles back.

Trevor knows an opportunity when he sees one and wastes no time. He darts out from behind the column and rushes forward just as Sypha swerves to avoid the yellow teeth again. The consecrated whip comes alive in his hands and slashes into the creature’s muzzle, opening up a deep gash. One of the blood-red eyes wobbles, loses its shape and leaks out of its socket. An ear-splitting howl rises towards the vault and Trevor feels genuine, mad laughter bubbling in his throat.

“Yes!!” With one long jump he closes the distance between him and his stolen dagger lying on the marble floor and slides towards the screaming creature. “Take that, you son of a bitch! How do you like me now?!”

He raises his hand, about to plunge the dagger into the other eye but before he can, the demon blurs and explodes into a thousand small, winged creatures. His laughter turns into a strangled cry as a whirlwind of teeth and claws tears at every bit of exposed flesh it can find. He clutches at his neck as one of them almost slices it wide open and feels another digging at his face.

_Shit! Shitshitshishitshitshit…_

He feels the temperature around him drop dramatically and ice gather under his feet. Sypha is clearly conjuring her deadly blizzard again but it does nothing to stop the black cloud of agony closing in on him. He swings his dagger blindly, hitting only empty air, as more and more of the demon bats take successful attempts at his face and neck. Just as he thinks that he is actually going to die the death of a thousand cuts, the bats suddenly cease their onslaught and fade away.

For a moment, he can only stand there, covered in blood as pain thuds through him and the chamber swims in and out of focus. That does not last long as a second later something slams into him so hard it forces the air out of his lungs and sends him flying straight into a malachite column.

Blackness blinks around him as his legs turn into jelly. He groans and shakes his head to banish the red mist clouding his eyes. The demon might still be alive and kicking but it has missed every vital organ by a mile. The loss of his eye has clearly impaired it just enough to let him to deliver the finishing blow. Maybe Lady Luck has not forsaken him after all.

He forces himself to stand up and finds the air leaving his lungs again.

The demon bat has had enough time to regain its form and now crouches in the middle of the chamber, where Trevor’s blood is still fresh on the marble floor. The vampire stands before it, his sword buried deep in the creature’s torso as yellow teeth gnash in powerless agony dangerously close to his head. His extended arm is keeping the monster just far away enough but as Trevor steps closer, he sees the pale hand’s grip on the blade falter. When he steps even closer, he understands why.

One of the monster's clawed wings has pierced the vampire clean through.

In a strange moment of clarity, he can’t help noticing that Alucard’s blood is as red as his. It runs in rivulets down the large claw protruding from his chest that pierces his back over his left shoulder, pinning him in place, like bait on a fisherman’s hook. His face is frozen in a rictus of pain and shock as he struggles to take a breath. A tiny oasis in Trevor’s mind unhelpfully points out that if that had been him, he would be dead already. Fate has been kind to him once again. Once again, it has thrown another person in front of him straight into Death’s embrace.

Just like with his mother and father. Just like with everyone in the Belmont clan.

As if aware of the long list of curses unfolding in his head, the clouded, golden eyes close, then slowly blink open and find his. When Alucard turns to face him, Trevor can see more bright, red blood trickling down the side of his mouth.

“Told you…” The words are little more than a hoarse whisper so he almost has to read his pale lips. “No...second chances, Belmont. Keep your eyes open or we all die…”

His voice devolves into a guttural groan as the demon drags him towards its open maw. Sypha stifles a cry and traces a rune that makes the air grow dry and heavy with the smell of sulphur. A fireball scorches the demon’s already damaged face but the second one dissolves into stray sparks and for the first time in forever Trevor hears her swear in frustration and anger. Her face grows paler under the blood and dirt, a clear sign that she is approaching her magic threshold and as he watches her struggle to her feet, he feels an indescribable rage flare inside him.

They are not dying here. Not her, not the damn Sleeping Soldier, not anyone. This ends now!

The consecrated whip cuts through the air like a thunderclap and wraps tight around the creature’s throat. It emits a long growl as its skin immediately erupts in boils and blisters. The demon roars and rocks back and forth in a weak attempt to throw off the hold but its efforts only manage to bury the vampire’s sword deeper in its entrails as what remains of its life spills onto the marble floor. He tightens the grip, hears the telltale hiss of the blessed material meeting demon flesh and stands back, ready to decapitate it in one swift move.

And then, he sees Alucard’s blood-speckled lips move again and cannot believe his ears.

For a moment he stands dumbstruck, convinced that he has hit his head way too many times. He is ready to ignore what he has just heard as a mere product of his exhausted mind but behind him Sypha freezes mid-rune as well. Blue eyes seek his, as if asking for an explanation but Trevor has none to give her. All he can do is turn back to the vampire and hear the same unfathomable plea escape his throat.

“Wait… not yet...”

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Dun, dun, dunnnnn!!!!! And so, our heroes are more fucked than they thought possible. The finale is coming next month. 
> 
> Meanwhile, as always, save a writer, leave a comment.


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